Crooked River 04/09

Just spent Friday the 9th and Saturday the 10th guiding on the Crooked River. Two days of tough fishing. The water level had begun to adjust for the irrigation season going from 220 to 400 cfs on Thursday the 8th. This didn't bode well for the catching. Lots of debris and dirty color made nymphing almost impossible without lots of frustration. However, the BWO hatch on both days was impressive regardless of the water condition. Although there was a great hatch, the fish were less than interested. We did find a few fish in the creepy slow water, which is typical of high flows, on "Midge Winkers" size 22 and "San Juan Worms". I think alot of anglers were taken off-guard by the new water levels since I didn't see a fish landed by any of the numerous anglers out there. I checked the level today and it's now over 1000 cfs! I don't know how much longer this will last. It's time to start thinking about the Middle Deschutes until the levels change on the Crooked.